DynaComware
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DynaComware Corp. (威鋒數位開發股份有限公司) is a type foundry based in Taiwan, Republic of China, founded in 1987 as DynaLab Inc. (華康科技開發股份有限公司). It is a supplier for CJK fonts with established businesses in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, USA.
DynaComware had also earned BCN Weekly News award for top font marketshare in Japan.
DynaComware fonts can be found in Chinese software, embedded and mobile devices. Major clients for DynaComware products include Microsoft, Apple Daily News, Matsushita, PC HOME, Taiwan government, Longhua technical university.
The company has been the only supplier for Traditional Chinese fonts for Microsoft Windows since the first production of Traditional Chinese Windows, until Windows Vista, where Monotype Corporation supplied Microsoft Jhenghei.
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[edit] History
In 1988, DynaLab entered Japanese market, with first Japanese product shipped in 1990.
In 1991, the company acquired CompuFont Limited. As a result, DynaLab had become the font supplier for Traditional Chinese Windows 3.1 for the default interface font in 1992.
In 1993-5-?, DynaLab started a Japanese branch, DynaLab Japan (ダイナラブ・ジャパン株式会社).
In 1995, DynaLab first released a CJK font supporting Unicode.
In 1996-9-11, DynaLab, Inc. announced the opening of a North America subsidiary in Santa Clara, California.
In 1997-12, DynaLab Japan's publishing business was moved to AsiaSurf Technology Japan (アジアサーブテクノロジージャパン株式会社).
In 2000-2, AsiaSurf Technology Japan was renamed to DynaLab Japan (ダイナネットジャパン株式会社).
In 2001-5, DynaComware Corporation (ダイナコムウェア株式会社) was established in Japan.
In 2001-7, the font products, licensing, electronic transfer and other businesses of DynaLab Japan Limited and DynaNet Japan Limited, were transferred to DynaComware Corporation.
In 2001-10-?, DynaLab Inc. in Taiwan was renamed to DynaComware (威鋒數位). However, the mainland China branches (including Hong Kong) still uses the old Chinese company name.
In 2003, DynaComware started online store.
[edit] Current branches
| English name | Localized name | Location |
|---|---|---|
| DynaComware Hong Kong Limited | 華康科技(香港)有限公司 | Wanchai, Hong Kong |
| DynaComware Beijing Limited | 北京华康信息技术有限公司 | Beijing, China |
| DynaComware Shanghai Limited | 上海华康计算机技术有限公司 | Shanghai, China |
| DynaComware Taiwan Inc. | 威鋒數位開發股份有限公司 | Taipei, Taiwan |
| DynaComware Corporation | ダイナコムウェア株式会社 | Tokyo, Japan |
| DynaLab North America (old) | DynaLab North America (old) | Santa Clara, California, USA |
[edit] DynaFont
The company's CJK fonts are sold under the DynaFont (華康字型) label since 1988. The name came from the company's founding name. Initially sold as ROM cards targeted for desktop publishing market, it was eventually offered in PostScript in 1991. The ROM card products do not store fonts in ROM, but stores font handling applications in ROM designed to improve transfer rate between connected devices on contemporary machines.
Japanese DynaFont product is first shipped in 1992.
In DynaFont families made since the conversion to Unicode, the CJK ideogram glyphs in a DynaFont are stored in composite font format. A final glyph is construced by applying hinting commands on the composite glyph.
[edit] Availability
In addition of selling retail font packages, DynaFonts are also bundled in the company's other typographic products. In America, the individual fonts are sold in its online store.
Linotype GmbH also sold DynaFont typefaces, but only offers the OpenType variants under the OpenType Std category.
[edit] Font Nomenclature
A DynaFont uses different font nomenclature system depending on locale.
Chinese font name starts with starts with name of the brand (華康), followed by the family, then font's weight, then character set. Font weight is specified with capital W, followed by a number, with bigger number representing heavier weight.
English font name starts with name of the brand, followed by the family, then font's weight, then character set. Font brand is DLC for the fonts originally from CompuFont, or DF for later fonts. DFP is used for fonts using proportionally spaced characters at Basic Latin block. DFG is is used for fonts using proportionally Latin and Japanese characters.[1]
Japanese font name starts with name of the brand, followed by the family, then font's weight, then character set. However, the brand uses the English font name convention. In PostScript CID font, the orders of font weight and character set are reversed. For families with multiple weights, not all fonts within the same family have weight number.
The English version of Japanese font name depends on following:
For TrueType font, name starts with name of the brand, followed by the family, then character set, then font's weight. Font with G character set supports Adobe-Japan1-5 character set.
For OpenType CFF font, name starts with name of the brand, followed by the family, then character set, then font's weight. Font with Std character set supports Adobe Japan 1-3 full character set.
For PostScript CID font, name starts with name of the brand, followed by the family, then font format, then font's weight. In Gaiji collection, name starts with name of the brand, followed by the family, then character set, then font's weight, then font format.
[edit] Other products
In addition to fonts, the company also produces font editor, font managers, font server software, and font engines.
In 1993, the company was also a distributor of Chinese version of QuarkXPRess.
In 2000, the company began development of DynaDoc, a portable document technology specially developed to handle the exchange of electronic documents for ideographic languages. Later DynaDoc products also incorporate DigiType technology.
In 2004, the company developed DigiType, a stroke-based font format.
